blog equipment

this is the first post of this blog at its new domain, blog.frog.equipment

this is basically a test post

corn grits; or “gribs” as i have been calling them lately while saying random words out loud in my apartment, ostensibly to my cat; are a staple food in the US southeast

however i regularly encounter friends and acquaintances who either have never had grits, or don't like them very much

follow my preferred grits recipe, which i eat most days, and you will change your mind because i am correct

ingredients:

• bob's red mill yellow corn polenta (all other grits are fake, and a lie)
• earth balance
• nutritional yeast
• salt
• black pepper
• sriracha
• vegan kimchi
• unflavored, unsweetened vegan yogurt (it's a sour cream replacement, and it is better, i like forager brand)

make

• get a big microwave-safe bowl
• put ¼ cup of grits in it
• put 1 cup of water in it
  • whatever you do, ratio of water to grits should be 4:1, this is highly variable between brands, but these instructions are correct for bob's red mill yellow corn polenta when cooked in a microwave
• put it in the microwave for 2 minutes
• when it beeps, do it for 2 minutes again
  • doing it in two steps stops the grits from overflowing
• remove from microwave
• shake salt and black pepper over the stop
  • truly it needs a lot of salt
• put a big spoonful of earth balance on there
• cover with a layer of nutritional yeast
• draw a sriracha swirl on top of it
• mix that all together really good, be sure and get down to the bottom
• put multiple big globs of kimchi on top
• put a scoop of the yogurt in the corner

complet

assuming you want to do the cheapest and easiest thing possible and use regular 8.5x11 paper, folded in half hamburger style, and the nearest black and white duplex printer:

1. in libreoffice, set the page layout to width=5.5” and height=8.5”
2. set all the margins to 0.5”
3. set the Gutter to 0”
4. IF YOU WANT A HEADER OR FOOTER FOR PAGE COUNT MAKE IT NOW
5. if you don't want the front page to have a “1” in the footer (it's the first page), do this
6. type your zine
7. drop your images in (make them black and white in gnu image first)
8. lots of fussing
9. literal days of fussing
10. export to pdf
11. go to https://nashhigh.itch.io/zinearranger or git clone https://codeberg.org/nashhigh/zine-arranger and run locally with python3 -m http.server --directory ./
12. load your PDF
13. select “half size”
14. choose “Print” (to PDF)
15. send file to the printer (godspeed)
16. print duplex (may the lord be with you)
17. staple THEN fold
18. complet

thank you https://nashhigh.com/ for this beautifully simple zine arranger tool

i could not find a complete guide for how to go from “all i know is libreoffice and linux” to “i printed a zine” using only free software, so i am scribbling this down

almost two months ago i posted about moving my phone number to a dumbphone. this is an update, and i will lead with the conclusion: it's been great (for me).

i want to be clear that i still have a smartphone

i still have a smartphone, it just doesn't have a SIM card in it. it can only connect to wifi, and GPS (all smartphones can, GPS is a universally available free public utility). i still have a smartphone because maps and encrypted messaging is table stakes in 2025, and because you really just have to click on links in order to do tons of basic things.

how do i use my dumbphone?

my dumbphone is basically a 2FA code device now. 99% of what happens on that phone is receiving 2FA codes. however, i also use it to make and receive regular (non-encrypted) phone calls. these phone calls are pretty much only to medical providers or utility companies.

the number on the SIM card that's in the phone is my real phone number that i give out to people — i'm not using any sort of voip or call forwarding service like google voice. the decision not to use any voip provider is mostly because this seems to cause problems for receiving 2FA codes sometimes, which i mentioned in a previous blog post.

i've saved some important contacts in the phone like close friends and family, but nothing more than that. it is not a secure device, so i treat it as though all the information on it could become public at any moment.

the dumbphone i got is an AGM M9. it is perfect, no complaints. i barely think about it. if you have specific questions about it feel free to email and ask and i can answer in an addendum at the bottom of this blog post. but do watch this review of it first because your question may be covered there.

how do i use my smartphone?

i still use it a lot! however because it only works on wifi, when i leave the house i look at it a lot less than before.

my phone is a carrier-unlocked pixel 8. it's still running CalyxOS. i install apps either from the f-droid app store or the aurora app store. i do not have a google account and i do not log into any google account to use the smartphone. aurora is the main thing that makes this no-google-account life possible.

here's some of the key elements of how i use my smartphone:

1) signal messenger

i use signal messenger for almost all communication with everyone i know. i installed signal from the aurora store despite the fact that calyx does make it available in the calyx repositories that they add to the f-droid store, because i found that that version of signal behaved very strangely (i couldn't switch apps or turn off the phone screen while in a signal call, or else it would hang up. also the app consumed a huge amount of battery). i would have preferred to keep using the calyx repository source for signal, but i rely on it heavily and really need it to work perfectly. so i uninstalled it with f-droid and reinstalled from aurora, and that version works perfectly.

2) delta chat

i have delta chat installed as a signal backup, because i think that having a backup strategy for if signal goes down is important.

3) maps

I use osmand for maps. it includes turn-by-turn navigation functionality that works completely offline and is really fantastic, all things considered. you do have to set up voice intructions with a text-to-speech engine yourself though, but it's not too hard. the recommended TTS on f-droid is rhvoice, and osmand has instructions.

one notable thing about osmand is you frequently can't just type in the address you want to go to. it just isn't very good at searching for addresses. almost always, i need to drop a pin and save a “favorite” ahead of time by comparing to some other map on my laptop. this is fine for me but could be a dealbreaker for someone whose life is different than mine.

many people prefer organic maps to osmand, and they use the same source data, so you should try that too if you're still deciding. i tried organic maps and despite definitely being more user-friendly, it just felt unfamiliar to me so i switched back to osmand.

my whole maps setup works perfectly completely offline, and in fact i exclusively use it offline because my phone only works on wifi. i rely on it heavily because i live in asheville, nc, us, which has paltry public transit offerings and a very car-centric life.

when i got my pixel 8, i got it with the biggest hard drive so that i could download lots of stuff, including maps. so i have full maps of the US, canada, and mexico that i keep on my phone at all times.

4) email

i use thunderbird-for-android for email and have like 10 email addresses in there 😅, no complaints.

5) gaia gps

i pay yearly for a gaia gps subscription, which allows me to go on dayhikes in the deep woods without planning ahead. i live on the boundary of pisgah national forest, and i like hiking, so i use this constantly and it's very much worth it for me. i've tried using open source alternatives for hiking and they didn't work quite as well, and the stakes are pretty high for this specific app working well, so i've stuck with gaia.

6) Tasks

i use the confusingly-named tasks app to manage todo lists and reminders. it syncs with a nextcloud instance that i and a few others use.

7) 1password

i'm too scared to self-host all my passwords so i still pay 1password for this.

8) calendar

i use whatever is the default calendar app in calyxos to do all my calendar stuff. i use fastmail for my personal email and i use their calendar infrastructure for my calendars. the calendar app on my phone syncs with the fastmail calendar server, the source of truth is fastmail.

9) browser

i did not install an extra web browser on this phone and i try to keep the default chromium-whatever one disabled, but it's tough. i regularly find myself in situations where i'm away from my laptop and i absolutely have to click a link in order to get a time sensitive thing done. at a high level, “i have to click a link to get a time sensitive thing done” is like The Reason I Still Have A Smartphone, and i think it really sucks and our world should not be set up this way.

10) lyft

i have the lyft app installed and maintain the health of my lyft account, because otherwise visiting friends in the northeast (DC – New York) would be way harder than it already is, and it's already hard! outside of visiting the northeast, i probably use the lyft app once every two years locally, when something weird is going on with my car.

11) public transit in general

because of where i live, i've not used my phone in its current configuration to do public transit. though i did travel to the northeast recently, that was before i moved my phone number to the dumbphone and made my smartphone wifi-constrained. for that, i temporarily downloaded citymapper because that's what i'm familiar with, and it worked fine.

12) wikipedia

i've installed the wikipedia app so that i can still doomscroll something when the browser is disabled. now i just “doomscroll” wikipedia, and it's so much better.

13) kiwix

kiwix is a critical part of how i use my smartphone. it is an app for hoarding data offline. i have the entirety of english wikipedia without images on my phone, and i use it all the time while just out and about. i also have a bunch of sysadmin and emergency medicine reference and prepper-type data. to get this stuff you just install the app and then download different packages of useful data through the app.

when hurricane helene hit us last year there was no internet or phone connectivity for two weeks, and i was not at all ready. next time i will be ready 😤

14) a physical notebook

i also started carrying a physical notebook. this has been great, it's really nice to make a list or whatever in a physical book rather than in a phone sometimes. it's just there for jotting things down to remember, and i don't journal in it or anything like that.

other questions

someone on the fediverse asked a couple specific questions, and i want to answer those directly!

How you picked your dumb phone – i wanted a phone that both had 4G and didn't have KaiOS (almost all dumbphones run KaiOS now it seems). kaiOS is basically just a smartphone with limited features (it still has a browser and stuff), and it's apparently full of ads! yuck! the AGM M9 is one of the few non-kaiOS 4G dumbphones available in the US. another popular one are the phones from sunbeam wireless, but i've never used that.

i needed 4G because 3G is being phased out across the US.

Messaging without cell data. (Does signal fall back to SMS?) – signal does not fall back to SMS. so the answer is “i don't message without cell data”. i only message on wifi. however if there's something time sensitive going on and i don't have wifi, i can always call someone on the dumbphone, which i do do sometimes. but i never have long or private conversations on there because it is not secure.

Your experience with turn by turn navigation, esp. on public transit – turn by turn navigation with osmand (after setting up rhvoice as described above) is great while walking and driving. i can't speak to public transit though because i don't use public transit where i live (it's small town america, it's only busses and they don't go most places), and i haven't visited the northeast since having a wifi-only phone.

A music pipeline, if you have one. It seems so hard to replicate streaming platform features – i don't listen to music on my phone unfortunately! if i were trying to do music stuff i would probably just put the music i wanted on my phone and find a good app for that in f-droid. however i'm quickly running out of room on the phone's hard drive. in my car i just listen to lots of CDs (that i buy used or burn myself from downloaded music) and the radio.

Any NFC uses to prepare for – i don't use my phone NFC for anything. i use tap to pay with my physical debit card, and i've used that on public transit too (in philadelphia).

thanks for your questions fedizen!

has moving my phone number to a dumbphone made me feel less online?

my main motivation in setting up my phone(s) this way was to “feel less online”. so far, i don't think it's done that. i still feel totally overwhelmed and upset with the world and the constant stream of nightmare information that we get slammed with every day.

however i do feel like i've been more “present” when i'm out in the world, away from home. despite not feeling overall better in my life from this phone change, actually being more present when out in the world is definitely a good thing.

if i want to “feel less online”, i think i will need to add new behaviors (like reading books and playing instruments) rather than just subtracting old behaviors (scrolling social media and news websites).

having the ability to leave home with only one device (most likely the dumbphone, for calling 911 if i have a medical emergency) is still very interesting, despite the fact that i haven't done it much. i've done it some, but not much.

i mentioned in my original dumbphone blog post that i have an unlimited wifi hotspot from calyx that i can use to fall back on if i need to use my smartphone out in the world. i've barely used it, which is a pleasant surprise! i'm glad to learn that i really just don't need to be connected to the internet all the time. the wifi hotspot is super useful for other reasons, and i didn't get it for the purposes of this dumbphone transition. also, i absolutely love the calyx institute so much and their software makes my entire non-google mobile computing life possible, so it's a no-brainer to support them by paying for the hotspot, even if i only use it every now and again.

do i recommend other people try this?

yes. if you think it could work for you, absolutely. however it's definitely not an option for everyone, because you have to be willing and able to contort your life a bit in order to do some basic things because many organizations assume you have an always-online device in your pocket. someone may not be willing (that's fine!) or able (job requirements, no home wifi, no laptop, etc) to do those contortions.

thanks for reading, and as always just email me if you have a question you want me to answer in an addendum here

📱📴📲🖁☎️🤳📞📳📶📵🤙

August 10th, 2025 addendum: CalyxOS has entered a period of crisis and will not release updates for up to six months. That's Not Good, so i'll have to figure something else out. you should not install calyx on your phone right now

i have a friend — she's an old lady born and raised here in the western north carolina mountains. she hates computers, yes, but she's been willing to learn a lot and quickly after joining a big signal group chat that our shared local community uses to keep in touch.

aside from memeing with the best of them in the group chat, she also maintains a large fish pond outside the house she built herself. this despite being in her 70s. she's an inspiration.

she has a landline. it works great, and the landline phone hardware works great with her hearing aids. she's had it for years. spectrum has a monoply in our area so the landline and her cable internet service is with spectrum.

she got a cell phone a few years ago. she got a smartphone basically because she had to to do basic life tasks, including joining the big signal group chat. at first she just used it on wifi, but quickly she decided she wanted to be able to use the phone everywhere so she got a cell phone plan from spectrum because they were already her ISP. spectrum mobile uses the verizon network — famed for its good rural coverage.

this is where things started to go haywire.

all her accounts on websites, things like email and bank accounts and health insurance and healthcare providers, they started trying to send her SMS messages in order to let her get into her accounts.

the SMS codes don't work, because they don't come. she doesn't have cell service at her house. it's up in the mountains, sure, but it's not isolated. she lives 20 minutes from downtown asheville and she has lots of neighbors on her road.

she turned on wifi calling on her phone. now she could receive SMS messages from friends and family, but 2FA codes still weren't coming through. i did some digging, and it turns out messages from 5 digit shortcodes often aren't supported over wifi calling. sometimes they are, but in her case they're clearly not. she has a current, stock iphone. she's using the spectrum-provided internet hardware. she knows how to use her phone.

i did more digging — it turns out some ISP-provided landline services support receiving SMS messages to the landline, and then a computer voice reads them out to you. “we don't offer that service” the spectrum chat told us.

some of these accounts can likely be converted to using TOTP 2FA rather than SMS 2FA. this is good, but you have to get in to begin with in order to turn that on. so what my friend has to do is:

1. make a list, over time, of the websites that she's locked out of because of SMS 2FA
2. not be able to use those sites at home the whole time she's making the list
3. schedule a meetup with a friend like me
4. drive to town to meet the friend
5. sit down and systematically go through the list of websites and convert them to TOTP
6. inevitably discover that some of them don't support TOTP
7. try and contact those companies and explain that they need to turn off SMS 2FA on her account so that she can use their healthcare/banking/email/whatever service from her home
8. discover that it's not possible to talk to a company anymore in 2025

other options available to her include

1. port her cellphone number to a VOIP provider that does support receiving SMS from shortcodes over wifi
2. spend hundreds of dollars setting up a cell tower signal booster outside her house
3. move

these are all ridiculous options that shouldn't be necessary in order to log in to a website.

if you look at the spectrum mobile coverage map where my friend lives, it shows she has perfect coverage at her house. and all her neighbors do too. all the way up the holler in fact!

this is simply false. she usually doesn't even have service 100 meters down the road.

another friend of mine who also lives out in the county, a millenial, once said that “SMS 2FA is the bane of [her] existence.” the valley she's in isn't even that deep.

and TOTP, the obvious alternative solution, is still pretty sorry. you have to download an app to do it, it's not just a capability that a phone has by default. and then when trying to find an app to use for it, you're presented with a multitude of high-stakes choices, and often pretty technical explanations if you start internet searching about which app to use.

i understand why SMS 2FA is so ubiquitous. when it works, the UX is good, nontechnical users intuitively understand it, and it's usually secure enough.

but there are 1.1 million people in these western north carolina mountains, 25 million in the rest of the appalachians, and many millions more in the mountain west and pacific ranges.

we have internet, but we have F-tier cell service — what are we supposed to do?

yesterday i moved my phone number to a dumbphone, here it is

the phone is an AGM M9 phone that supports 4G and comes in both international and US versions. you can buy it here

i still have a smartphone, since most of my communication happens over signal and i do not want to give up the privacy of signal texts and calls for SMS and regular phone. i also rely on my smartphone for maps with osmand, but that works completely offline. i will just only use the smartphone on wifi. i also have an unlimited wifi hotspot from calyx so i can get wifi on my smartphone out in the world when necessary

i want to see what happens when i have the ability to leave home with only a smartphone and no regular phone, or to leave home with a dumbphone but no smartphone hellscreen yet preserve the ability to call a cab or 911 or a friend or a taxi if something unexpected or bad happens. i want to be less phone, and less online, or at least more consciously online. and i'm hoping that separating the concerns of phone/small computer (smartphone)/big computer (laptop) completely will do that

another potential benefit from this is that apparently the cell radios on these pixel phones are known to crap out quite often. when that happens, everything other than the actual cellular phone continues to work. so putting the phone concerns onto a different device is sort of insurance

this is basically an experiment. if it sucks i will stop. i can also move my SIM card back to the smartphone anytime. i will eventually update here about how it goes

📱📴📲🖁☎️🤳📞📳📶📵🤙

my partner and i recently visited philly and dc. we live in north carolina. typically for this trip i would drive to the northeast, then park the car and train around the northeast. however we wanted to test out the experience of taking the train for as much of the trip as possible. we did that and we learned some things

some important amtrak meta: amtrak north and south of washington DC in the US is two very different experiences. north of DC, the train is fantastic, electrified, fast, frequent, cheap-ish, and everyone takes it all the time between boston and DC. south of DC, the trains are not electrified (they use diesel or something), are way less frequent, and their right-of-way over freight trains is not as protected and respected as it is in the northeast. delays are way more common, sometimes extreme (multiple hours), and it's just not very common to train down here. one exception is the train between charlotte and the triangle (raleigh-durham-chapel hill) — that stretch of train is pretty good and many people who live in central NC, especially people who went to college in central NC, have taken that train

the train doesn't come to asheville where we live, so we drove to charlotte where my parents' house is, where the train does come. we parked my car at my parents house and took a lyft to the train station to start our journey

learning 1: though it's theoretically possible to take the bus to the amtrak station in charlotte, it's not a real option if you're taking the train all the way to the northeast because the trains that go that far only leave twice a day, very early in the morning (5:30am-ish and 6:45am-ish). taking the bus to the train then would require “waking up” at like 3am, getting a ride from my parent's house to the nearest bus stop (not walkable with luggage unless you recently thru-hiked the appalachian trail), taking the bus to the bus depot, transferring to the bus that goes to the amtrak station, and then waiting at the amtrak station for anywhere between 15 minutes and three hours depending on delays

our train left on time (6:45am). there are two northeast trains from charlotte — “the carolinian” and “the crescent”. the carolinian makes more stops between charlotte and the northeast and so is a longer ride to the northeast corridor, but it originates in charlotte so it's usually on time leaving from charlotte. the crescent makes fewer stops between charlotte and the northeast so is technically a shorter ride, but it originates 700 miles southwest of charlotte in new orleans, so it's much more likely to be delayed arriving to and leaving from charlotte

learning 2: the carolinian is most likely the best option for anyone getting from NC to the northeast (unless you want a sleeper car which is only on the crescent), because of where it originates and the likelihood of delays as a result. the map/schedule for the carolinian is here

the first few hours of our train ride were great. really most of the ride was great. but as we plodded across north carolina the delays started to slowly pile up. we overheard from other passengers that this is common even in the well-trod stretch of the carolinian between charlotte and the triangle. one of the delays was apparently because someone was on the tracks outside greensboro and the train had to activate their emergency breaks and then talk to the police when they came to the situation. the conductor told us all this over the loudspeaker.

past raleigh, the train goes through a part of north carolina i've been to a few times but don't regularly travel to. once it continues on to virginia the stops are less frequent (it is the carolinian after all), before arriving in DC and then basically becoming a different train

learning 3: north carolina is so beautiful and seeing it by train is very special. in particular the stretch of the country between rocky mount NC and petersburg VA is incredible — it's mostly swamp that the train traverses on a sort of raised berm. just hundreds of miles of swamp

when the train arrived in DC, we sat. we sat and sat and sat. the train lost power for about 30 minutes while getting a new electrified engine, got the new engine, an entirely different crew, and then we set off towards new york where the train terminates. my partner and i got off in philly, about 1.5 hours delayed

learning 4: it takes much longer to get from charlotte to philly on train than by car. the drive is 8 hours and 45 minutes. the train ride was about 13 hours. 13 hours is too long to be on a train

also

learning 5: the business class / coach dynamics on amtrak are really different south of DC than they are north of DC. the train felt heavily racially and class segregated between business and coach south of DC, and this was not nearly so much the case when i took amtrak a lot while living in the northeast

now we'd arrived in philly, and without a car! so i'll say some things about that. first off philly was great and neither of us had ever been. we obviously took every trolley line including the really old trolley in fishtown. trolleys randomly become subways, busses arrive everywhere every five minutes. philly seems pretty bus-pilled and i'm here for it, if it works it works. asheville should get bus-pilled. anyway, doing philly without a car was effortless. we stayed near the amtrak station and it was a great location for getting around the city. we visited iffy and wooden shoe and they were both so fantastic. we visited a friend in south philly and wandered around clark park in west philly.

learning 6: asheville needs to get bus-pilled. also in philly you just tap your regular debit/credit card or phone to use transit and it's incredibly convenient. obviously everywhere should accept cash forever, and i think philly does this by taking cash at machines that dispense transit-only tap cards, but tapping with debit card is beautiful, seamless

eventually we left philly for DC. we sprung for an acela (the fanciest and fastest amtrak) between philly and DC. leaves a million times a day so we picked our perfectly preferred time and left. everything was right on time. philly amtrak station has piles of seating (glares hatefully at moynihan)

we arrived in DC and our friend we were visiting met us at union station, easy peasy, however...

learning 7: life is hard in DC if you don't live on the metro, busses seem to be spotty, at least in northwest

our friend doesn't live close to a metro station, the closest is about a 35 minute walk. a 35 minute walk is doable sometimes, but we were expending energy moving around a lot and also we're not used to walking (particularly me). there's busses near her, but they are pretty inconsistent and don't run much past 10pm. we went to multiple shows and so were getting back late often. also all our phones are weird because we have zealotous opinions about computers, so it was hard to take busses even with a local. all this meant that we took lyfts a lot in DC, and that felt stupid and bad. we maybe could have done better with planning, but i'm not so sure

on our way out, we just took a lyft all the way to union station. we definitely could have done better with that, but we were up late the night before

returning to charlotte, we took the carolinian again. the train arrived home about 1.5 hours delayed, and this trip really highlighted the difference between driving and training south of DC: the train trip from DC to charlotte was about 11 hours. driving would have been 6 hours and 20 minutes

yikes

apparently on the train back, the wifi didn't work consistently, or maybe even most of the way. we didn't know, because we have an unlimited hotspot from calyx (highly recommend) and we used that the whole way. i then proceeded to leave the hotspot on the train when we got off, which was a $400 mistake

yikes

learning 8: bringing your own hotspot on the amtrak is necessary to guarantee internet access, though there's nothing you can do to get internet around quantico because it is a black hole of hopes, dreams, and cell service. but don't forget your hotspot on the train

ah i need to say something about food here also. there is food on the train but the lines can be very long and the dining car closes often and sometimes runs out of food. if you have any dietary restrictions whatsoever you need to plan all your own food

learning 9: you have to pack food like you're going on a long dayhike. we did fresh fruit, carb-y snacks like crackers, fruit leather, and trail mix. bring your own paper bowls to divvy up food between you and your travel companion, disposable utentils, and your own napkins and hand sanitizer, because food tools are difficult/inconvenient to acquire on the train. your hands will feel disgusting because the bathrooms are...not good. so having sanitizer and utensils and plates and napkins is an amazing comfort. also earplugs/noise-cancelling headphones/whatever are completely, utterly, essential. kids scream, people snore, the train takes half a day, my nerves were very frayed and blocking out sound was essential.

we arrived in charlotte about 1.5 hours late, maybe two hours i'm not sure, and had the scariest lyft ride of my life back to my parents' house

learning 10: lyft rides can be terrifying in cities like charlotte, where there's sometimes no traffic and very wide roads, so it's very possible to speed. both our rides in charlotte were too fast, but our last ride was the first time i've ever thought i might die in a car accident in a rideshare. i'm talking 65mph in a 35mph zone, tailgating like crazy, and fussing with two phones the entire time. for the first time in my life i reported a driver to lyft

the main takeaway

taking a train to the northeast was overall a great experience. however, my partner and i concluded that in the future we will drive to the northeast corridor, park the car long term somewhere calm but on the DC metro (probably silver spring maryland), and just train around the northeast. the travel time to DC is just too long compared to car, and the comfort level of the train for that long is just too low. flying is not an option for us for personal and environmental reasons. sleeper cars are about five times more expensive than coach, so that's a hard sell too

another main takeaway we had was that the northeast is just really quite far from us! going there regularly is probably not something we really want to do. instead, we're hoping we can make less frequent but longer trips up there, so we see everyone we love in the northeast over a multi-week period

🚆🚄🚅🚉🚂🚇🛤️🚞🚃💺🚈🚝

blog.stillgreenmoss.net {
	handle_path /robots.txt {
		root /srv/writefreely/robots
		file_server
	}
	encode zstd gzip
	root /srv/writefreely/static
	reverse_proxy localhost:2000
}

root@closet:~# ls -la /srv/writefreely/robots/
total 12
drwxr-xr-x 2 writefreely writefreely 4096 Apr 28 14:32 .
drwxrwxr-x 7 writefreely writefreely 4096 Apr 28 14:31 ..
-rw-r--r-- 1 writefreely writefreely   26 Apr 28 14:26 index.txt
root@closet:~#

root@closet:~# cat /srv/writefreely/robots/index.txt 
User-agent: *
Disallow: /
root@closet:~#

you can make posts from your shell with this one weird trick https://codeberg.org/stillgreenmoss/post

low-effort dark mode:

@media (prefers-color-scheme: dark) {
    body {
        background: black;
        filter: invert(1);
    }
}

caddy webserver config:

blog.example.com {
	encode zstd gzip
	root /srv/writefreely/static
	reverse_proxy localhost:8080
}

edit: i also remembered that i wrote a different unit file because the one in the example had some things in it that aren't necessary for debian bookworm. here is mine:

[Unit]
Description=WriteFreely Instance
After=network.target

[Service]
WorkingDirectory=/srv/writefreely
ExecStart=/srv/writefreely/writefreely
User=writefreely

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target